marquevsmarquiseTell them apart

Which to use

“marque” and “marquise” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#47,747
“marque” frequency rank
#41,756
“marquise” frequency rank
89503
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature marque marquise
Definition A brand of a manufactured product, especially of a motor car. A marchioness, especially one who is French.

Where the eye mixes marque and marquise

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence. marque runs 6 letters (CVCCVV) against marquise's 8 (CVCCVVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
marque
8 ch
marquise

Visual trap between marque and marquise

A purely visual mix-up. marque (/ˈmɑː(ɹ)k/) and marquise (/mɑː(ɹ)ˈkiːz/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 89503, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

marque is recorded at frequency rank #47,747, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈmɑː(ɹ)k/. marquise is at rank #41,756, tagged as anoun, pronounced /mɑː(ɹ)ˈkiːz/.

Glosses for this pair are partially populated in our dataset, but the full side-by-side definitions above should still guide you to the right choice.

With a confusion score of 89503, this pair ranks #5,127 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of marque vs marquise

Shared letters: aemqru. Private to "marque": -. Private to "marquise": is.

"marque" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV  ·  "marquise" · 8 letters · shape CVCCVVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • marque ← amrque · maqrue · marqeu · marqque · marrque · maruqe · mmarque · mraque
  • marquise ← amrquise · maqruise · marqiuse · marqquise · marquies · marquisse · marqusie · marrquise

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "marque" and "marquise" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (/ˈmɑː(ɹ)k/ versus /mɑː(ɹ)ˈkiːz/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary English text, does "marque" or "marquise" show up more?
"marquise" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #41,756 in our English list, against #47,747 for "marque". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Eye-level mix-up between "marque" and "marquise" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "marque" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "marquise" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #5,127 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "marque" and "marquise" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Marne vs marque". Nearby pair
  • Recorded mistypes exist for at least one side of this pair, useful when a spell-checker or OCR lands on the wrong form. See mistypes

Confusion rank #5,127 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list